So, I'm realizing now that while I was on the island the reason I was able to write eveyday was because I actually had free time to do things like blog. There will never be enough time to rehash all of my daily activities so I'll just highlight the major events of my last few days.

I suppose that showering won't seem like a major event to anyone else, but showering "navy style" here for the first time was a bit of an adventure. Whenever I want hot water in the bathroom I go to this little porch outside the bathroom and hook up the gas to the water heater and light it. So I'm showering and everytime I turn off the water to soap up I start shivering. I was pretty convinced that it was actually so cold and that I was over reacting a bit, but when I got out of the shower I could see my breath in the bathroom. Needless to say I either need to work out a better system or I will be very glad to welcome in the warmer weather.

For the next week I'll be in an intensive language orientation class designed to help us with Spanish that will be immediately useful to us, directions, ordering food, etc. Every day in class we go for un paseo, a walk, so our teacher can introduce to another part of the city. Two days ago we walked to the Alhambra so we could see the view of the city. The Alhambra sits on a hill in Granada so once at the top you have an incredible view of the entire city. Unfortunately this also means you have a pretty intense hike to get there. Then that afternoon we walked to the Albyzin, which is the older portion of the city, also very high with another beautiful view of the city. It was so incredible to be able to see the entire city, but about four hours of really engaging walking later we were all exhausted.

Yesterday the whole IES group took a bus about an hour and a half away to a city situated in the Sierra Nevada where we met with three guides who took us on a three hours hike through the mountains to another city where the buses met us. The walk was way harder than I anticipated, which was pretty unfortunate because we were all forced to spend more time watching our feet than the surroundings. And we were all panting a good portion of the time so talking was fairly limited. All of these little cities in the mountains look incredibly pristine and whitewashed from our view on the hike (see picture...), which was a bit ironic to me because the chapter I'm reading in Moby-Dick right now is the portion about the terror the color white can cause. While we were hiking we passed a little house that belongs to a little Spanish man in his 90's named Enrique. Most of us stopped and talked with him for minute and took pictures with him, which of course thrilled him to no end. Today I'm hurting like crazy, but it was absolutely beautiful.

I'm still adjusting to the city, I've been hopelessly lost a few times, and to the home life, but my family here has been just incredible. The past few days my host brother and I have had lunch together and it's been a blast getting to talk to him. Yesterday he showed me his snakeboarding video on youtube. You can check it out at http://youtube.com/watch?v=UYAtAlnvVy4.

It's a beautiful day here again so I think I'll sit out on the terrace and read. Hasta pronto, besitos.
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